Gender Mainstreaming at the Parliament: A Study of the 2004-2009 House of Representatives (DPR) and House of Regional Representatives (DPD)

Authors: Ani Soetjipto; Sri Budi Eko Wardani; Yolanda Panjaitan

This study discovered that the biggest challenge to mainstreaming gender at the House of Representatives are the procedures of political parties,including that of their party groups at the House of Representatives, which give their members no autonomy. Not only do the parliamentary party groups at the House of Representatives prevent their men and women members from voicing the aspiration of the people and constituents, they also determine the assignment of their members to the bodies of the house to either leadership or membership posts. Under this kind of structure, it is almost impossible for women to win the leadership or even membership posts at the house bodies, let alone there is a fact that the central management (DPP) often interferes with direct appointments. Not surprisingly, there are very few women members leading the bodies of the 2004-2009 House of Representatives. Lobbying, experience, argumentation, and the position of women in the structure of the party at central level are the biggest problems that women have to face in their aspiration to enter strategic posts.

The Standing Orders and Code of Ethics of the House of Representatives contain the normative provisions of how to become an ideal member of the house cannot be effectively implemented due to the excessively strong roles of the parliamentary party groups and weak enforcement of the regulations. Most provisions in the Standing Orders and the Code of Ethics are gender neutral and have not addressed gender-based discrimination issues including sexual harassment. Similarly, the Standing Orders and Code of Ethics of the House of Regional Representatives are still ineffective in implementation and have not moved beyond procedural issues towards evaluating the performance of its members.

The House of Regional Representatives applies a different approach in filling the chairperson and membership posts of its bodies from that of the House of Representatives. At the House of Regional Representatives, the individual capacity and networks of the candidate play a very decisive role. The absence of intervention from political parties creates a favorable condition for women members of the House of Regional Representatives to run for chairs and membership posts of the house bodies. The roles of the bodies of the House of Regional Representatives are less political than those of the House of Representatives, such that its women members have more freedom to express their desires. The relation among members also tends to be more collegial. One of the problems preventing women members of the House of Regional Representatives from optimising their roles is limited individual and networking capacity when they are in Jakarta.

Among the hurdles the Women Parliamentary Caucus faces in the attempt to optimise its role is, in addition to the fat structure of the organisation, the leadership model in which leaders are appointed based on the number of votes won by the parties (sometimes irrelevant to the leader’s competence and capability), and that a chairperson role is subject to rotation once every six months. This model creates a problem for the caucus in advocating priority agendas and in quickly responding to the current political situation from the perspective of gender (hunger, Indonesian migrant workers, violence against women, and so on). The lack of the gender perspective among women members of the houseoften entraps the Women Parliamentary Caucus (especially at the House of Representatives) into becoming a mere amplifier of the political parties/party groups interests.

Actually, in such a political context, women could have played more significant roles at the 2004-2009 House of Representatives which was relatively independent from the executive. Unfortunately, the relative independence that the House of Representatives assesses against the executive over 2004-2009 was never used to voice the aspirations of the people, or to effectively oversee the performance of the executive according to the mandate assigned to it. Instead, political parties raucously struggled for short-term benefits and personal or group economic interests. The 2004-2009 period, saw \ “economically motivated political transactions” characterized by prevalent practices of corruption, incompetency, moral hazard, and other misconducts of the members of the House of Representatives from many political parties.

Such political context largely results from the political party system in Indonesia over 2004-2009. It will be difficult to mainstream gender at the parliament without mainstreaming gender at political party level first. Political parties are the door through which women will enter the parliament. Political parties also determine the complexion, qualifications, and competences of their women candidates and the perspective they will carry to the parliament. Unfortunately, 2004-2009 did not see an excellent understanding of the affirmative action and gender mainstreaming in political parties. These concepts are generally taken for granted as women’s own issues. Most political parties take women representation and agenda as something irrelevant and unrelated to their interests (there is no such thing as gender mainstreaming at political parties). Gender and women issues are assigned to the internal department in charge of women issues. Parties still have difficulties defining the strategic meanings of the presence of women in a political party and the benefits of gender mainstreaming in there. The affirmative concept as an initial step towards improving women’s participation in politics has been defined only in terms of quantity and sex, without any attempt to improve their capacity. The issue on gender, hence, becomes a marginal issue and never gets to the mainstream programs/platforms or the vision or mission of any political party.

Over 2004-2009, the women movement actively pushed forward and advocated the importance of improving the representation and participation of women at political decision-making institutions and of gender mainstreaming at political parties. For women, there are no formal politics and informal politics. The women movement actively works on and distributes themselves to all arenas, formal and informal and micro and macro. The biggest issue is how to create synergies and build communication to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of political work.